NBA to announce plans for All-Star Games in NYC in 2015, Toronto in 2016

Yahoo! Sports | Sep 25

We've known that the 2014 NBA All-Star Game will be held in New Orleans since two Aprils ago shortly after New Orleans Saints owner Tom Benson reached a deal to purchase the then-league-owned Hornets which paved the way for the birth of the Pelicans and by extension the rebirth of the Charlotte Hornets. (Kind of a big couple of days there.) Now according to a pair of Tuesday reports we're getting closer to locking down the destinations for those traveling to the next two February exhibition extravaganzas. A word to the wise: Dress warm.

First Fred Kerber of the New York Post reports that preparations for holding the 2015 All-Star Game in New York City and dividing hosting duties between the New York Knicks and Brooklyn Nets — which incoming NBA Commissioner Adam Silver discussed during this past February's All-Star Weekend in Houston — are nearing completion:

Plans to split the activities between the two teams were proposed openly last February but the arrangements under which the Sunday All-Star Game would be staged at Madison Square Garden and other festivities — such as the dunk contest 3-point shootout and skills competitions — would land at Barclays Center have not yet been publicly announced.

“There are still some logistics to be worked out but it looks like the announcement will be this week” one source said.

Kerber also reports that the NBA would like to keep the ASG in NYC again in either 2017 or '18 with an eye toward reversing the roles proposed for the '15 affair. In that scenario "Barclays Center would house the All-Star Game while the Garden would showcase the other events" but the Nets and Barclays have yet to decide whether they're on-board with that idea. The 2015 game would mark the fifth total All-Star appearance in New York and the first since 1998.

The '15 ASG apparently won't be the only midseason celebration announced this week according to Ryan Wolstat of the Toronto Sun:

Multiple sources told the Toronto Sun Tuesday that the Raptors are on the verge of landing the 2016 NBA all-star weekend.

An official announcement is expected shortly that will reveal further details of how one of the sport's biggest weekends will tie in to the Toronto Raptors' 20th-anniversary season.

Say it with me now: WHITE VEGAS!

Wolstat says there are still some elements to be nailed down in the Toronto plan but bringing the '16 All-Star festivities north of the border in celebration of two decades of Raptors basketball was something that Tim Leiweke — the recently hired president and chief executive officer of Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment the parent company that owns the Raptors the NHL's Toronto Maple Leafs Major League Soccer's Toronto FC and the Air Canada Centre in which the Raps play — identified as a top priority shortly after taking the job in late April.

“I think it would be great for the fans. I think they deserve a little bit of positive news" he said at the time according to Eric Koreen of the National Post.